Method of manufacturing electrodes



W. S. BRIAN METHOD OF MANUFACTURING ELECTRODES Original Filed Nov. 25, 1944 Dec. 4, 1951 Inventor- William S. EST-Ian,

y M WM His Attorney- Patented Dec. 4, 1951 METHOD OF MANUFACTURING ELECTRODES William S. Brian, New York, N. Y., assignor, by

mesne assignments, to General Electric Company, a corporation of New York Original application November 23, 1944, Serial No. 564,768, now Patent No. 2,422,945, dated June Divided and this application August 14, 1945, Serial No. 610,794

1 7 My invention relates to an manufacturing control electrodes or gridsand is particularly adapted to the manufacture of control grids for electric discharge devices employing planar electrodes.

This application is a division of my copending application Serial No. 564,768, filed November 23, 1944, now Patent No. 2,422,945, granted June 27, 1947, and entitled Method of and Apparatus for Manufacturing Electron Discharge Devices.

The manufacture of planar grid electrodes for electric discharge devices in accordance with prior art methods, particularly where the grid wires have been of small diameter, has been a relatively slow and expensive process. In accordance with the teachings of my invention, I provide a new and improved method of making such grid electrodes which is particularly adapted for mass production...

It is an object of my invention to provide a new and improved method of fabricating control electrodes.

It is another object of my invention to provide a new and improved method of fabricating control grids for electric discharge devices employing planar electrodes.

It is a still further object of my invention to provide an improved method of manufacturing control electrodes which is well adapted for mass producing electrodes of the planar type.

My invention will be better understood by reference to the accompanying drawing and its scope will be pointed out in the appended claims. In the drawing, Fig. 1 is a schematic representation of apparatus for carrying out my improved method; Fig. 2 is a plan view showing the material from which the grids are fabricated as it appears after each step of the method; Fig. 3 is a plan view of a completed grid fabricated in accordance with my improved method, and Fig. 4 is an elevational view, partially in section, of the grid structure shown in Fig. 3.

In Figs. 1 and 2 of the drawing there is illustrated a method, in accordance with the invention, of manufacturing grid electrodes for use in the electron discharge device employing planar electrodes. The grid electrodes may be used to advantage in electric discharge devices of the type described and claimed in my copending application Serial No. 557,126, filed October 4, 1944 and assigned to the assignee of the present invention. The method represented in Figs; 1 and 2 comprises intermittently feeding a continuous metallic sheet or ribbon I to a pluralityjof successive operating stations A, B, C and D. The

improved method of V 4 Claims. (01. 29-2514) metal ribbon I may be supplied from. a suitable feed roll or spool 2 and is passed over one or more guide rolls 3, past the stations AC, inclusive, and to an indexing mechan sm 4 which imparts to the ribbon I an intermittent step-by-step ad- Vance. At station A there is provided a punch or die for punching in the ribbon spaced apertures la, preferably of circular configuration. Between the stations A and B there is fed a superimposed continuous ribbon 5 of metallic grid, this ribbon being fed intermittently and synchronously with the ribbon I. The term grid is used in its generic sense toinclude a group of parallel wires, a mesh or screen or a perforated sheet. The ribbon 5 may be supplied from a feed roller or spool 5 and passed over one or more guide rollers or spools I and through the indexing mechanism 6. Station B comprises a punch or die forv deforming the grid 5 within each aperture into a dish-like configuration 5a having a plane bottom parallel to the plane of the ribbons I and 5. Station .0 includes provisions .for line welding or otherwise bonding the grid ribbon 5 to the apertured ribbon I about the periphery of each aperture; that is, station C may comprise a suitable electric resistance welder. At station D there is provided a die or punch for punching from the superimposed ribbons I and 5 a series of composite disks, each of a diameter larger than the apertures la in the ribbon I, the resulting apertures in the superimposed ribbons being represented at lb. A detail of resulting composite disk is shown in Fig. 3, in both plan and cross section, from which it is seen that the dish-like grid portions 5a are surrounded by an annular frame or flange 5b to which the peripheral portion of the grid or mesh 5a is welded, as illustrated schematically at 50, thus providing an accurately formed, rigid grid electrode.

In order to ensure synchronism between the several operations performed at stations A, B, C and D, there is provided a common driving mechanism B which, by means of a shaft 9, actuates the operating mechanism at each of the stations, as represented schematically by the several crank and link mechanisms 9a, 9b, 9c and 9d, and which also actuates the indexing mechanism 4 to ad- Vance the superimposed ribbons I and 5 an appropriate distance between each successive operation. It will be understood that the details of the mechanism for practising the method described form no part of the present invention but that such a mechanism may be of any conventional type.

From the foregoing description it will be apparent that my improved method is particularly adapted for producing planar rids from strip stock, and particularly where the successive steps of fabrication are accomplished at adjacent stations of an automatic machine or apparatus such as the one illustrated in the drawing.

While I have shown and described a particular embodiment of my invention, it will be obvious to those skilled in the art that changes and modifications may be made without departing from my invention in its broader aspects, and I, therefore, aim in the appended claims to cover all such changes and modifications as fall within the true spirit and scope of my invention.

What I claim as new and desire to secure by Letters Patent of the United States, is:

1. In the method of manufacturing an electron discharge device, the method of manufacturing a grid electrode which comprises, punching an aperture in a metallic sheet, superimposing a metallic grid over said aperture, deforming said grid within said aperture to a dish-like configuration extending from the side of said sheet opposite the side to which said grid is applied, bonding said grid to said sheet about the pe-- riphery of said aperture, and punching from said sheet and grid a composite disk of a diameter larger than said aperture.

2. In the method of manufacturing an electron discharge device, the method of manufacturing'a grid electrode which comprises, punching an aperture in a metallic sheet, superimposing a metallic grid over said aperture, deforming said grid within said aperture to a dish-like configuration with a plane bottom parallel to said sheet and a composite disk of a diameter larger than said aperture.

3. In the method of manufacturing an electron discharge device, the method of manufacturing a grid electrode which comprises, intermittently feeding a continuous metallic ribbon to a plurality of successive stations, at a'first of said stations punching spaced apertures in said ribbon,

between said first station and a second of said grid 2, series of composite disks, each of a diam-- eter larger than said apertures.

4. In the method of manufacturing an electric discharge device, the method of manufacturing a grid electrode which comprises punching an aperture in a metallic sheet, superimposing a metallic grid over said aperture, deforming said grid and the marginal portion of said sheet surrounding said aperture to provide a dish-like configuration extendin from the side of said sheet opposite the side on which said grid is superimposed, bonding said grid to said sheet about the periphery of said aperture and punching from said sheet and grid a composite diskof a diameter larger than said aperture.

WILLIAM S. BRIAN.

REFERENCES CITED UNITED STATES PATENTS Number Name a Date 1,692,387 Schmitt Nov. 20, 1928 2,220,909 Kershaw' Nov. 12, 1940 2,282,392 Bieling May 12, 1942 2,413,689 Clark et al. Jan. 7, 1947 2,455,868 Koch Dec. 7, 1948 

